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Thread: Blue Filter Apps VS Blue coat lenses

  1. #1
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    Blue Filter Apps VS Blue coat lenses

    How exactly can I explain to my customers if they were to bring up the question on blue filter apps? They seem to create a yellowish tint on your smart devices and does seem to help relax the eye a bit.

    Basically how do I convince them that it's better to get blue coated lenses.

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    Quote Originally Posted by thejun View Post

    How exactly can I explain to my customers if they were to bring up the question on blue filter apps? They seem to create a yellowish tint on your smart devices and does seem to help relax the eye a bit.

    Basically how do I convince them that it's better to get blue coated lenses.


    Blue light will be neutralized by the yellowish color, as per photospectrometer.

    Ar coatings with blue reflectors will reflect part of the blue light that is not entering the lens directly.

    Therefore a yellowish tint is your best protection.


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    Master OptiBoarder OptiBoard Gold Supporter Judy Canty's Avatar
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    Blue light apps may be fine for their electronic devices, but does nothing to protect from other sources, such as CFL bulbs. Blue light reflective coatings are also nice, but only reflect part of the damaging HEV light. Their best bet is a blue light absorptive lens material such as Blue Tech or TheraBlue.

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    Master OptiBoarder optical24/7's Avatar
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    Not meaning to hijack the thread, but Judy; Is your avatar a picture of a pop tart on your shoes?

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    Master OptiBoarder OptiBoard Gold Supporter Judy Canty's Avatar
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    Nope. It's my business card holder. Do they make Pop-Tarts printed with eyes?

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    Master OptiBoarder optical24/7's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Judy Canty View Post
    Do they make Pop-Tarts printed with eyes?
    The way my vision is working, they might as well! ( Or it may be my hunger factor. A pop tart sounds good about now...)

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    ATO Member HarryChiling's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by thejun View Post
    How exactly can I explain to my customers if they were to bring up the question on blue filter apps? They seem to create a yellowish tint on your smart devices and does seem to help relax the eye a bit.

    Basically how do I convince them that it's better to get blue coated lenses.
    Apps only tune down the blue hue effectively emitting less, the lenses actually filter. It's like standing next to an X-ray machine with the settings on low compared to wearing a lead apron.
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    Quote Originally Posted by optical24/7 View Post
    The way my vision is working, they might as well! ( Or it may be my hunger factor. A pop tart sounds good about now...)
    I've got some pop tart on the bottom of my shoes. It's yours for the asking. I can't tell if it's peanut butter and maple leaves or maple and part of a peanut butter butter sandwich, either way the combinations sound good.
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    I dunno. I'm still not convinced. There was never a problem with blue light until lens manufacturers realized they could make a filter. There was never a "blue light problem" from the sky or the ocean. So if the only problem is blue light from devices, why aren't screen color adjustments adequate? If blue light is really as damaging as they say it is, I think all device makers should be required by law to reduce the emissions, otherwise they will be tied up in court with class-action suits for decades to come. Think step-ladder warnings, asbestos, and NFL head trauma syndrome....you've got to stop the damage at the source.

    Being in the optical business, we all just think an optical solution is best...but what does the rest of the world think.

    Some schools of thought support full spectrum visible light (not UV, of course, which is invisible).

    Call me obstinate...but I'm still willing to be convinced.

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    ATO Member HarryChiling's Avatar
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    Mitsui is releasing a 420cut material that is supposed to be less yellow, I am looking forward to seeing it in NY.
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    It is a gray area and as we know this has been debated endlessly on optiboard.

    The big difference today is people are staring at a bright LED light sources 24 inches from their eyes and it is has a significant spike in the violet/blue spectrum. Human eyes evolved to look at objects lit by the sun, not to stair at LED lights 8 hours a day. Old CRT screens did not have anywhere near the brightness of LED screens and the spectrum emitted was warmer in color. Is staring at an LED light all day bad? Is it better to be safe than sorry? I read the info provided by the Vision Council and others and generally agree with it.

    A significant % of people work in front of a computer in CFL lit offices and a significant % of these people suffer from DES. They will buy something to reduce the effect of DES. They can buy it from their eye doctor or off the shelf at Costco or Walgreens. You can call it snake oil as others have on this board but consumers will buy blue light reducing glasses and love them. To them it works. An ECP can provide this as a superior product with an Rx, office lens, ready-made reader powers with quality lenses and coatings, or whatever you choose to provide. Or the ECP can just give this market to Costco and Walgreens and let them serve this demand.

    And to the original poster, you need to educate your patients regarding the light emitted by LED screens. You can do a simple demo in the office with a plano blue filtering lens and an ipad. You can clearly see the effect the coatings or yellow tinted lenses have on transmission of blue light. Also, read this: http://www.thevisioncouncil.org/digi...in-report-2016

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    Whenever you see white light, all three primary colors are present, in roughly equal amounts. If you take away most or all of the blue by yellow tinting or by blue reflecting, the resulting light will be yellow, because the remaining primary colors are red and green, and red and green light makes yellow light. One thing about this that is strange. You can get monochromatic yellow light without using red and green, and you can get it by adding red and green light. I think there is some difference there in appearance, but not sure how different and how you could tell without a spectrometer. So all seriously blue absorbers or reflectors will add a yellow color to the lens appearance when viewing white light. They will also affect other colors being viewed by adding more yellow (yellow light will look more yellow, if possible, and red will look orangeish, blue things will look darker blue, or even black if most all the blue is removed, and so on).

    Fun stuff.
    Last edited by Dr. Bill Stacy; 01-27-2016 at 06:27 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by fjpod View Post
    I dunno. I'm still not convinced. There was never a problem with blue light until lens manufacturers realized they could make a filter. There was never a "blue light problem" from the sky or the ocean. So if the only problem is blue light from devices, why aren't screen color adjustments adequate? If blue light is really as damaging as they say it is, I think all device makers should be required by law to reduce the emissions, otherwise they will be tied up in court with class-action suits for decades to come. Think step-ladder warnings, asbestos, and NFL head trauma syndrome....you've got to stop the damage at the source.

    Being in the optical business, we all just think an optical solution is best...but what does the rest of the world think.

    Some schools of thought support full spectrum visible light (not UV, of course, which is invisible).

    Call me obstinate...but I'm still willing to be convinced.
    I think that there is a gray area with the new blue blocker technology, whether one utilizes an absorption, reflective, or both as a solution. We have made lenses with a light pinkish brown tint for our patients in the high tech industries for many years. I will say this, for my patients who are spending 30 hours a day 8 days a week at a computer or a digital device, most find these lens treatments more comfortable then without. I sell these for occupational purposes only and I wear them myself while in the office. I stay clear from the assertions made by several companies that blue light increases AMD, as there seems to be no empirical evidence supporting these claims. What we do know about blue light is that the damage is accumulative, permanent, and there is a disruption of the circadian rhythm for many long term users of these devices. If one is looking at the newer products as long term protective measures, that is where the merit lays. If one is looking at these as a scare tactic and pressuring their patients into these products, that is another matter.
    I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it. Mark Twain

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    Circadian disruption is very debatable. It really depends on the intensity, and wavelength being discussed. Insufficient intensity, or wrong wavelength, it will have no impact. If people want to limit any potential circadian disruptions, they're better off turning off ambient lighting and turning down the brightness on the light emitting device as much as possible after sunset. That's a cheap, easy, free, solution, which saves energy (since you're turning off ambient lighting" and increases the battery life of the device (by turning down the brightness of the screen and thus the energy the backlight is consuming or the intensity of the emitted light if its an OLED device).

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    Quote Originally Posted by fjpod View Post
    I dunno. I'm still not convinced. There was never a problem with blue light until lens manufacturers realized they could make a filter. There was never a "blue light problem" from the sky or the ocean. So if the only problem is blue light from devices, why aren't screen color adjustments adequate? If blue light is really as damaging as they say it is, I think all device makers should be required by law to reduce the emissions, otherwise they will be tied up in court with class-action suits for decades to come. Think step-ladder warnings, asbestos, and NFL head trauma syndrome....you've got to stop the damage at the source.

    Being in the optical business, we all just think an optical solution is best...but what does the rest of the world think.

    Some schools of thought support full spectrum visible light (not UV, of course, which is invisible).

    Call me obstinate...but I'm still willing to be convinced.
    Actually I too believe that we should be seeing the full spectrum visible light. As mentioned by you we never really had a "blue light problem" until recently with the introduction of blue filter lenses. However there were quite a number of positive feedback from customers using blue filter lenses and it also does increase our sales a bit...so...

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    I'm no Essilor fan (and am kind of surprised that VSP is now doing Essilor products), but Essilor's basic scientific research on rat retina cells was pretty definitive that SOMETHING is different about those certain blue visible wavelengths than all the others, because the rat cells died much sooner under the deep blue than under all the others. It's that something that has fueled all the controversy. Whatever that something is, I don't like the sound of it participating in more rapid apoptosis, whatever that participation turns out to precisely be. I'm playing it safe until it's settled, and offering some protection. My patients seem to appreciate that position. and being aware of the issue.

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    Yeah. .. The rat cells in a petri dish. .. No lens, vitreous, Cornea, aqueous or tear film in front of them. ..

    I still say, if devices are so damaging, the manufacturers better get on the stick and fix them before they wind up in court.

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    Master OptiBoarder AngeHamm's Avatar
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    It's important in these discussions that we make a distinction between visible blue light and HEV blue light. Simply making a lens or monitor more yellowish doesn't necessarily have any effect on HEV blue frequencies.
    I'm Andrew Hamm and I approve this message.

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    Agreed, but the biggest problem as I see it is all these little kids holding powerful mobile devices 3 or 4 inches from their eyes, for hours on end. It's more educating the parents than the manufacturers, who will only have to post warnings on their devices. The most they need to do on their devices is to put a parent lockable setting on the blue diode circuit. No big deal.

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    In addition, the blue light "spike" data seems to have been gathered with the as yet unknown unknown mystery screens all pushed to their maximum brightness, as well as shifted as 'cool' as possible. Meaning of course, that 99.9% of humans do NOT use their screens with those settings, and further do NOT sit with their screens 10 cm f4om their noses for hours on end.

    At this point, the "data" appears HIGHLY suspect, the conclusions spurious, and the "solutions" about as valid as the crazy Internet lady trying to remove all "chemicals" from her "natural" foods. (Even though ALL food is made of chemicals...and ALL white light has blue in.)

    It makes money for lens manufacturers and labs on unproven, dubious conclusions.

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    One can object to the experimental methodology until one is blue in the face, but one shouldn't disregard that in those petri dishes, SOMETHING caused the rat retina cells to die faster under the blue than any other wavelength. That SOMETHING happened to those cells is not dubious, unproven or false.

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    If it weren't so spurious, we would have hard, repeatable, peer reviewed data, with real human testing, showing very specific frequencies and energy levels proven to induce damage.

    Still waiting...

    But the lens guys and labs are not. They can't wait to make a buck - despite the lack of above evidence.

    In the rush to market, their darts are all over the board with just about any frequency or frequencies targeted, and to wildly different levels of attenuation. Hardly scientific.

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    No we wouldn't have. Real human testing which is no doubt going on around the world as I write this, but will take years to complete, and really will be mostly retrospective since you cannot exactly subject children to hours of close exposure voluntarily. Would you allow your kids to be so abused?

    So we can wait for the retrospective studies for years, or we can assume that whatever kills those rat cells may pose a hazard to children if not adults. I'm taking option #2.

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    Give me enough funding and I can make those rat retina cells dance in the petri dish if you want. Those kinds of studies just aren't all that useful for how such potential mechanisms work in real organisms. They're a good starting point for further experimental design in more complex and appropriate models, and that's about it. To extrapolate what it could mean beyond that is just a step too far.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Dr. Bill Stacy View Post
    ...So we can wait for the retrospective studies for years, or we can assume that whatever kills those rat cells may pose a hazard to children if not adults. I'm taking option #2.
    Do you have any idea how many times researchers, doctors, policy makers, and health advisory organizations have opted for option #2 in medicine and not only did it turn out when the major studies were finally in that they were wrong, but what they were doing was actually causing a harm that went undetected in the preliminary studies? Medicine has burned way too many people too many times to not wait for the studies to be completed.

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